Contingency Planning By The Numbers By Penny Reynolds, The Call Center School
The recent hurricanes that hit
Florida have many call centers once again pondering their disaster
recovery options. It seems to take a few disasters to make us dust off
our contingency plans to see if they're up-to-date and capable of seeing
us through a real emergency.
A big part of contingency planning involves calculating costs. Costs to
prevent or recover from certain events must be weighed against the cost of
the actual impact should that event happen. This impact analysis involves
calculating and attributing a value to each customer contact so the team can
calculate the cost of being out of operation.
Even in those centers that do not generate revenue directly, it is important
to agree on a value for each answered contact to serve as a base. Then each
measure of prevention should be evaluated to see if the call center could
realistically afford each one. Sometimes the cost of prevention is much
higher than what the cost of recovery or lost business would be. But more
than likely, the cost of an ounce of prevention is less than the pound of
cure that might be needed in the end.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) recommends an impact analysis
using a format similar to the one provided here.
To use the chart, list the types of emergencies identified down the left
column. Estimate the probability of any risk that has been identified. While
this is a subjective exercise, it will help in determining which risks to
prioritize in the prevention process. Use a scale of 1 to 5 with 5 as the
highest probability. For example, a fire has a low probability and a network
failure has mid-range potential, according to the sample analysis chart.
Next, assess the potential human impact of each emergency, including the
possibility of death or injury. Assign a rating of 1 to 5 with 5 as the
highest potential impact. The sample chart shows a fire as having a high
impact on people, but the network failure has a low impact rating.
Assess the potential impact to property in terms of losses and damage. Once
again, use the 1 to 5 scale with 5 being the highest. Consider the cost to
replace, the cost to set up temporary replacement and the cost to repair.
The fire in this example would have a high impact on property and a network
failure would have little impact.
Score the potential business impact, including loss of market share.
Consider business interruption, employees unable to report for work,
customers unable to reach the company, company in violation of contractual
agreements or regulations, fines/penalties/legal costs and lost sales. The
impact of a fire and the network failure are rated relatively high.
Look at the internal and the external resources to calculate your ability to
respond. In this case, a low score is better. Consider the following
questions for each type of emergency:
' Do we have the needed resources internally to respond?
' Will external resources respond as quickly as needed or will there be
higher priorities for them to serve?
In the sample, the internal resources available to respond to a fire are
considered higher than those available to respond to a network failure.
External resources are considered high in both cases.
The final step is to add up the columns. The lower the score, the better it
is. This ranking will help prioritize the planning and funding of solutions
in the efforts that follow. The sample shows both the fire and network
failure are relatively equal in their impacts. Of course, the rankings that
would be assigned by any planning team could be quite different from those
in the sample.
Prevention Techniques
Once the impact and resulting priorities are known, the next step is to
determine what the prevention techniques are and estimate the cost of each
option. The possibilities must include changes of procedures and other
simple options along with the more elaborate solutions such as dual vendors
and major system enhancements. Management will want to see a variety of
possibilities and the costs associated with them before authorizing funds
for a solution.
The options should provide a range of prevention possibilities, with some
offering full prevention and others providing only partial protection. The
team should apply a score to the potential for the prevention technique to
mitigate the risks, and to be consistent with the impact analysis, a rating
of 1 to 5 is reasonable with 5 representing total prevention.
An estimated cost must be determined for each technique. When compared to
the other options under consideration and the score for the prevention
effectiveness, the best choices should become clear. A sample prevention
options analysis chart is shown here.
Recovery Techniques
The planning team will also need to consider the recovery options should the
contingency plans fail. Once again, the recovery options will range from
simple manual processes with minimal expense to complete building
replacement scenarios. Recovery can be partial or full, in stages or all at
once, and the techniques considered must cover the full range of options.
In this stage, scoring the recovery techniques for their effectiveness
(partial to full recovery) should be done along the 1 to 5 scale with full
recovery options scoring a 5. This will be compared to the cost of each
option and compared to other choices to find the best solutions to present
to management for consideration.
Assigning some numbers to the risks, as well as the prevention and recovery
options, will assist you in determining priorities and selling the plan to
senior management so you are prepared should a disaster hit.
Penny Reynolds is a founding partner of The Call Center School, a
Nashville, Tennessee-based consulting and education company. She is the
author of several call center management books, including Call Center
Staffing ' The Complete, Practical Guide to Workforce Management.
Contact her at [email protected]
or call 615-812-8410.
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